Saturday, January 17, 2015

Where was this museum?

OlgaPhoto

Here is another from my tiny stock of my mother's double-exposure slides

that were in the giant batch that I sent to Scancafe for scanning last year.

I am beginning to wish there were more. I don't know quite how to describehow delighted I am by this great-eyed beaten-metal face and the pointy breastplatein juxtaposition with the sheer domesticity of a child, a neighborhood and a fence! I don't recognize the child, but maybe someone in my family will. . .

Here is another poem from Ted Kooser.

Walking on Tiptoe

Long ago we quit lifting our heels

like the others--horse, dog and tiger--

though we thrill to their speed

as they flee. Even the mouse

bearing the great weight of a nugget

of dog food is enviably graceful.

There is little spring to our walk,

we are so burdened with responsibility,

all of the disciplinary actions

that have fallen to us, the punishments,

the killings, and all with our feet

bound stiff in the skins of the conquered.

But sometimes, in the early hours,

we can feel what it must have been liketo be one of them, up on our toes,stealing past doors where others are sleeping,and suddenly able to see in the dark.Ted KooserDelights and Shadows, Copper Canyon Press, 2005, page 5.